ode to a red van, the many andy bernards of the world, and a whirlpool of awesome!

i set this out on facebook on the 2nd of may. i think. now i'm in kansas with my sister and nephew, and it's the first time that i have seen them in a year, so that means that it's the first time that i have ever seen my nephew. he is pretty awesome. so without further disruption, to the story of traveling home. . .
wow guys, i have to admit that the ride home was in many different ways almost fatal, but i am pleased to say that i have finally made it home, and i wish to share the adventure with you all.
so for the first adventure, the red van of doom. when i left utah i went up to montana to see my grandpa. he has cancer pretty bad, and has to go to chemo every week. so we were up there, and we were supposed to leave that monday, and we did leave. we were driving up the pass between butte montana and bozeman montana when one of the lifters on the red van of awesome stops working. because it stopped working we lost oil pressure, and one of the bearings ripped a hole in our engine somewhere, and oil was leaking. we weren't over the pass yet, but we made it over by turning the van on and off trying to get it over the mountain. we finally reached the top of the mountain, and we don't think that the van will make it any farther, so my dad tries his cell, but there is no coverage. i have two bars, so my parents sent me running up to the top of the mountain right next to the road to see if i can get better coverage to make the call. i ran to the top only to find out that coverage wasn't any better. yeah, i have to admit that definitely took the cake. running up the mountain was like when i decided to hike to the trailhead, i could reach out and touch the mountain. it was basically like crawling really fast on lots of lose rocks and red clay. i wish you all could have seen it. so i get back down to the van, and we decide to see how far our car can coast. turns out that the van can coast for 35 miles. wow.
so we finally get the car to a mechanic where they tell us that we need to find another engine and another transmission for the van to work. we were stuck in a town called three forks, where there was one car shop and two motels, around 5000 people. we went to the car place and found a van for $16,000 with only 15,000 miles on it and it was an 07. we got it on tuesday, and we were going to get a trailer hitch put on it for our trailer at three that after noon. we get to the trailer hitch place and they can't have the hitch there until thursday because it has to be special ordered because of stow and go seating. we found another dealership and bought another van and they put the trailer hitch on then and there for free.
this is where andy bernard comes in. i was chilling with my little brother in the 07 at the dealership where my parents are looking at other cars, and i see a dead look alike for andy bernard, and he was the one that helped my parents pick a van. thank goodness he wasn't as annoying as the andy bernard in the office, and it turns out that he was actually a mormon too! way awesome. so after purchasing an 07, we purchased and 04 and continued on our way on wednesday morning. what a car adventure.
i have to admit that it was pretty awesome owning four vehicles for a short period of time, but on wednesday we returned the '07 and went on our way. it was hard driving through the rain and often times snow, but we finally made it home. it as only when we got home that we realized that everything in the trailer (all of my stuff) was soaked. yeah, i have to admit that i wasn't too happy.
the other cool part about the trip home was when we stopped on wednesday night. we stayed where there was a pool, so my little brother and i wen swimming. true, the swimming pool only went to six feet deep, but my little brother and i decided to create a whirlpool by running around the walls of the pool in a circle. i have to say that it was awesome because it actually worked. i hoped that it would but when it did, that was even better, so i floated around the pool in circles after we got it going.
so i finally made it home yesterday around nine at night, and i have to say that it was a crazy adventure. for sure. i really wanted to write it all in haiku, but that would definitely take too much work. so after being home for only 40 hours i am actually going to go to wichita kansas to help my sister and her baby for all of next week. i shall let you all know how the adventure goes.
cheers